Monday, 31 March 2014

Unexpected Facts About Sleep

The Science of Sleep

Today, the World Day of Sleep, in different countries conferences and other events dedicated to this important part of human life. And we offer a selection to reading facts about sleep that seemed to us the most interesting.

1. Why you can wake up screaming

Night terrors - is sleep disturbances associated with abnormal physical movements, behaviors, emotions, perceptions and dreams. With a nightmare easily confused, but the only similarity is that both the one and the other occurs during sleep.

At night the fear of people do not realize what is happening to them. The main difference of the night from a nightmare of fear that in the first case, a person partially awakens, and the second - continues to sleep. Furthermore, they occur at different phases of sleep. Most often, fears arise between midnight and two o'clock in the morning, as well as during daytime sleep.

During the attack the night of fear man suddenly straightens up and starts to cry, often something quite meaningful like, "They'll kill me!" Sleeping face is distorted with rage, or the person seems to protect yourself from the invisible threat, or is afraid of something like worms in bed .Heartbeat - palpitations, perspiration on the body, the pupils - dilated. This state may last from ten to twenty minutes, and if chronic condition, the attacks may occur up to 16 times a night.

A distinctive feature of the night is the fear that affect a person's impossible. In fact, interfere even dangerous - people nekontroliruem. Most people in the morning absolutely do not remember anything about the night incident. Well just what they then fall asleep easily - unlike nightmare.

Most often suffer from night terrors boys from five to seven years, but the girls are also prone to this, although less often - according to statistics, about 17% of young children experiencing night terrors. As a rule, as they mature night terrors occur less frequently, and then completely tested.

But in addition to age, other factors - the cause of night terrors can be emotional stress, stress, fatigue or conflict. Also, the reason may be associated with post-traumatic stress disorder, generalized anxiety disorder or sleepwalking.

From night terrors helps psychotherapy - the point is that life stress should be reduced to a minimum.

2. Optional sleep a lot - just believe in what you slept well

New research suggests that there is a placebo effect of sleep: just believe in what you slept well enough to be productive and energetic during the day. Particularly well this technique will only work if people say that they slept well, any reputable psychologist or doctor.

The experiment was conducted on a group of undergraduates. Students briefly told in lectures about the nature of sleep, and then connected them to the equipment, which allegedly should provide researchers with information about the quality of their sleep last night (actually just equipment measures brain frequency). Then one of the experimenters allegedly coefficient calculated how well students slept. Those who said they slept well tests performed better and faster than those who said they slept poorly.

Of course, if students stop to sleep at all, this technique will not work. Effect is most similar to another already known to us the effect that if a man say that he is up to the task, then it probably really cope with it, and if you pre-configure it to fail, then the probability of failure increases.

3. Only 3% of people are able to feel normal, if not sleep more than 6 hours per day

Dream - a purely individual thing, so while you sleep, for which the person is completely poured, also depends on the person. There are two factors that affect sleep: According to research by scientists from the Department of Medicine at the Harvard School, it is the age and genetics.

Genetics affects not only how much sleep you need, but also the structure of sleep and wake-up time as well as your preferences for certain tasks at different times of the day. Most adults need about eight hours of sleep per night, and a very small percentage of people (about 3%) can be productive during the day, emptying the entire six hours - that they owe to their genetics.

Typically, the older you get, the less sleep you need. Here is a short list on how many hours you need to sleep on average people of different ages:

neonates (a month or two) - from 10.5 to 18 hours;

Babies (three to 11 months) - from 10 to 14 hours;

small children (from one to three years) - from 12 to 14 hours;

preschool children (three to five years) - from 12 to 14 hours;

children (five to 12 years) - from 10 to 11 hours;

Teen (12 to 18 years) - from 8.5 to 9.5 hours;

adults (from 18 years up to the end of life) - from 7.5 to 8.5 hours.

Studies have confirmed that those who sleep too much or too little increases the risk of death compared with those who slept enough.

4. Hungarian soldiers had not slept for 40 years and was quite happy

Paul Kern was a Hungarian soldier who participated in the First World War. He was an excellent soldier and fought even when they were killed all the other soldiers of his company, for which he was awarded a medal. Despite his fighting skills, he also received a gunshot wound that was supposed to kill him, but Paul survived.

Paul was shot in the head and part of his brain was damaged. The bullet had destroyed part of the frontal lobe - a wound would have killed anyone. But the only thing that has changed in the life of Paul after he was wounded - he could no longer sleep. At all.

Doctors carefully inspected it and could not understand how he managed to survive. In fact, the inability to sleep was the only soldier problem. Hypnotic and sedative pills did not help. This may sound awful, but Paul did not suffer - part of his nervous system was also destroyed. The man did not take the exhaustion and assured everyone that feels great. Kern did not sleep for 40 years - until his death in 1955,.

5. Your dreams really affect your real life

According to research, the content of our dreams is reflected in our real relationships with other people during wakefulness - for example, a matter of controversy and doubt the next day. Thus, dreams can predict the future behavior of couples, especially intimate relationships.

The researchers asked more than 60 men and women to record details of their dreams, as soon as they wake up, as well as to keep a personal diary and pay special attention to the records relating to their relationship with the second half.

If people saw the night in a dream partner, then the next day it led to problems in the relationship, and after the dreams in which there was a conflict with a partner, followed by serious difficulties in the relationship. If the dreamer in the dream changed the second half, it led to a decrease of love and trust, and the effect is kept within a few days.

However, not all the results were negative: those who in a dream saw something relatively pleasant partner, spent more time with him and approached him in real life.

However, researchers are not entirely clear whether the subjects acted unconsciously influenced by dreams, or their actions were motivated by an analysis of his dreams - all the dreams they could then read in the diary and rethink.

6. Why do you wake up five minutes before the alarm

The internal clock of your body is just as good, if not better, as the mechanical clock. In the center of the brain is a cluster of nerves called core suprahiazmalnoe supervising body clock - the circadian rhythm. It defines the periods of sleepiness and vigor, controls blood pressure, body temperature and sense of time.

In fact, our body - perfectly tuned machine, and this machine likes predictability: body work is most effective when there is a routine sequence. So if you go to sleep and wake up at the same time for a few days, the internal clock is adjusted under this schedule.

Sleep-wake cycle is regulated by protein PER. Protein levels rise and fall throughout the day, reaching a peak in the evening and at night fall. When the PER is low, your blood pressure drops, heart rate slows down and thinking becomes more vague - you become sleepy.

If you wake up every day at the same time, the body learns to produce enough PER at the right time - about an hour before waking level PER together with body temperature and blood pressure starts to rise. To prepare for the stress of waking body produces a cocktail of stress hormones - cortisol.

That's why you wake up before the alarm . In fact, your body hates this alarm clock - for it is a rude awakening stress shock. Service negates all the work of your body - it prevents him from waking up gradually, naturally.

By the way, if you do not wake up to an alarm clock, you probably will not fill up or go to sleep not on schedule. For example, if you get up at different times on weekdays and weekends, the "reset" setting the internal clock. Without schedule your body does not know when to wake up, so when the alarm goes off, you feel dazed and irritated.

You press the snooze button, and because your body is awake, even under stress, the subsequent REM sleep more knocks internal clock. Hormones that help you fall asleep, mixed with hormones that help you to wake up - the body gets confused, and with each repeated wake-up call is only getting worse. So trill morning - this is the worst way to start the day.

7. Sleep on your left side can save you from heartburn

Acid indigestion, or heartburn - a burning sensation in the chest. The reason for this phenomenon is the unpleasant regurgitation of stomach acid us. Originating in the chest, burning can spread to the neck, throat and even the jaw. Heartburn may result in the development of gastroesophageal reflux disease.

Most of us are familiar with this unpleasant sensation, but keep in mind - sleep on the left side of the body can help to cope with heartburn, while sleeping on the right will only exacerbate the situation.

Presumably, this is because during sleep on the right side of the circular muscle, which prevents the penetration of food debris from the stomach into the esophagus relaxes, ceases to perform its function, and the acidity of the esophagus thus increasing.

8. From brain scans can spy, what do you dream

Scientists were able to develop a technique of decoding brain impulses, allowing to understand the category to which your dream, up to 60%.

The fact that in our dreams often repeated the same visual images, such as "tree" or "man."Researchers have identified some 20 major categories, developed separately for each participant.Note that items such as, for example, "Ice ax", "key" and "piston" will refer to the same category - "instruments."

Three volunteers were asked to view photos from the Internet, corresponding to these categories, and at this point their brain activity was monitored. Then the obtained data were entered into a specially designed computer program, and then scan continued even during sleep. Researchers led by neurologist Yuki Kamitani at this point monitored the brain activity of subjects. As soon as possible to determine what the volunteers they dream, they were awakened and asked to describe their dreams.

While the system is far from perfect and can only guess the visualization of a wide variety of categories. Decoding the same items of dreams is not currently possible.

9. If you suddenly wake a sleepwalker, nothing bad will happen to him

There is a common myth that if you wake a sleepwalker, he can survive a severe shock, and it may even have a heart attack. In fact, such a wake-up from sleep is not dangerous in itself. But if you happen to see a man who walks in his sleep, it is better not to wake him - and for him and for you.

While in it's own awakening a person suffering from lunacy, nothing dangerous to his health no, there is a high probability that people could get hurt by surprise himself and harm to the one who woke up. Usually sleepwalker begins to walk in the third stage of slow wave sleep, also known as "REM sleep." At this stage, a very deep sleep and wake up at this time is difficult, but not impossible. However, the awakening can lead to cognitive impairment (scientists call this condition "sleepy inertia"), which can last about 30 minutes.

Experts in the field of disorders associated with sleep, argue that a man suddenly awakened from a deep sleep, can greatly frightened, not long to understand where he is or not come in very excited.He could easily not you know, push or hit. But even if such a person did not react aggressively, it can still cause harm to you and to myself: many lunatics in a dream go to the kitchen to cook or even try to drive a car with all the ensuing consequences.

Instead wake a suitable person in a dream, experts advise gently and slowly take him back to bed.

10. Lack of sleep spoils you privacy

Poor sleep significantly affects your everyday relationships in pairs usually one of the partners, which is poured or less often dreaming nightmares becomes grouchy, begins to complain about life and blaming the other is that it does not appreciate or do not pay enough attention. Researchers from the University of Berkeley, wondered why.

Scientists asked 60 couples of all ages, from 18 to 56 years, to keep a diary of sleep. Participants were required to write every morning, how well they slept, and add that they feel towards their partner. Also during the settlement of disputes in the family waged video recording. Those people whose sleep was worse, is much more intolerant and irritable.

There are several reasons why a person can not sleep - such as snoring or loud noises from the next room, which interfere with sleep. And some people are proud that they sleep in 4-5 hours a day and can go without sleep for a long time.

Experts recalled that restful sleep is essential for physical and mental health, but in order to feel cheerful and active person needs about 5 to 8 hours of sleep every night.

To date, one in three people in the world suffer from insomnia. Normally poured only 40% of the world's population.